


Artemis and Apollo

by WombatPumpkin



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Angst and Feels, Dreams and Nightmares, F/M, Friends of Red Jenny, In the Fade, Post-Dragon Age: Inquisition - Trespasser DLC, Short, Solavellan Hell
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-23
Updated: 2021-02-03
Packaged: 2021-03-14 06:01:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 4,510
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28915773
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WombatPumpkin/pseuds/WombatPumpkin
Summary: On a mission with the Friends of Red Jenny, a visitor enters the Inquisitor's dreams.He is the wolf who stalks. She is the halla lying in wait.
Relationships: Female Lavellan/Solas, Fen'Harel | Solas/Female Lavellan
Comments: 4
Kudos: 9





	1. Chapter 1

“Pish.” Sera slaps her leg as she chortles to herself. “Did you see Lord Bendy Bits’ face when I stuck him in his? Bloody brilliant.” She cackles as she tucks into her soup, wrinkling her nose when she puts the spoon in her mouth. “Tastes like arse. Bleh!”

“Sorry, I’m not much of a cook,” Lavellan laughs and pointedly does not try the soup, knowing better. She sets her bowl by her feet and takes a bit of bread instead.

“Yeah, I wouldn’t quit your day job if I were you,” Rainier teases, then grimaces as he carefully takes a small sip. “Kind of mildewy,” he observes with a note of wonder. Sera nearly falls off the log she sits on, doubled over laughing. 

“Need I remind you, Rainier,” Lavellan points out. “It was your idea that I take dinner duty.”

“Something I may regret the rest of my life,” he says, hanging his head for the melodrama, and only half joking. 

“We could use this,” says Sera in a burst of brilliance. “Imagine creeping into some old noble’s house and replacing his larder with this horse shit!” Tears roll down Sera’s face, her cheeks rosy from fiendish delight. Thom joins Sera, both howling with mirth, while the Inquisitor grins and laughs, rubbing the back of her neck and feeling a touch embarrassed.

It's late, night having fallen over the thick wood the trio picked for camp, just far enough away from the estate Red Jenny had ransacked earlier in the day. The air is frosty and smells like snow, and Rainier throws a couple of extra logs onto the fire, building it higher. Lavellan uses a little magic to help the Warden, the least she could do after her poor attempt at food. The evergreens glint emerald in the moonlight, their branches sturdy and bracing for the first snow of the season. But that won’t be tonight, Lavellan notes, looking up at the clear sky, stars winking from on high. 

“Thanks for coming, Thom,” Sera says, nudging him in the ribs with her elbow. 

“Yes, it’s good to have you. I didn’t expect you’d be able to join,” the Inquisitor says as she spreads out her bedroll beneath the canopy.

“I’ve earned a bit of leave,” replies Rainier gruffly with a shrug. “Plus, I’ve missed you ladies.” 

“We missed you too, beardy,” Sera says. “You should come more often. Well not like that, but maybe like that. That’s dirty. But you know what I mean.”

Rainier chuckles and shakes his head as he lays out his bedroll as well. “I’ll do breakfast in the morning,” he offers.

“Probably a sound call,” Lavellan grins. “Sorry again about dinner.”

Lavellan walks around their camp, setting up small wards and alarms in the trees and bushes. Sera digs a satchel out of her pack and opens it, counting something quietly to herself on her fingers.

“What’s that?” Rainier asks.

“This?” Sera says. She holds up the bag and snickers. “It’s all Lord Prissy Bits’ underthings. So when they find him in the morning, they’ll wonder why he’s got none. It’s great, innit?” 

“Somebody is going to start tracking this,” says Rainier. “Why all the nobles in Orlais have suddenly stopped wearing any underpants.”

“Like it’s a conspiracy or something?” Sera’s eyes dance devilishly in the firelight as she giggles and snorts, rolling out her bed and slipping into it. 

“That should be us set,” Lavellan says with satisfaction, observing the warded perimeter with an approving nod. There’s a faint glow around them, a bluish-white light emanating an inch or two off the ground. It hopefully won’t keep them awake. 

“Excellent.” Rainier gives an approving thumbs-up. “Thank you, Inquisitor. That should keep us safe ‘til morning. Sleep well, you two.”

“You too, Ser Beardy,” Sera says, nestling down under her covers and pulling the blankets over her head. Lavellan slips into her bedroll, shivering and eager for her feet to warm up. For a moment, she wonders if magically heating the air in her blankets is a good idea, but thinks against it, remembering how she’d almost once set her bed on fire doing just that. 

It had been a long day, and it doesn’t take long for the camp to fill with Rainier’s snores and Sera’s snuffles as they sleep and dream. Lavellan drifts away, though sleep isn’t quite the same for mages. She will wake in the morning, feeling rested, but sometimes her eyes open and she feels as though her brain has been working all night. 

Lavellan finds herself in the same forest she, Sera, and Rainier are temporarily calling home, but it’s different in the Fade. The sky above is gray, a dim sun peeking behind a thick layer of clouds to cast hazy shadows across the forest floor. The trees are thicker here, their trunks black and twisted, bent and charred as if a fire had taken them long ago and left their skeletons to bleach in the sun. She wonders when in history the forest was finally cut down to make way for the evergreens and pines. 

A layer of snow, no more than sixes inches deep, coats the ground. The Elvhen woman is dressed warmly in her dark travelling cloak lined with fur, but she still trembles from the cold. It’s a chill she feels in her bones and belly, a sensation that radiates from her rather than from the place she dreams of. The wood is still, save for the mirage that always dances at the edges of the Inquisitor’s line of sight. But though all lays silent, Lavellan feels the hairs on the back of her neck stand and knows she is not alone. 

Thrice this has happened over the last few nights, the feeling of eyes on her. She thinks for a moment, quickly deciding she’d rather not wait for her pursuer to make the first move, and she steps from camp to press into the woods, careful not to look over her shoulder. Snow crunches beneath her feet, her breath rising like steam above her head as she cranes her ears to listen, waiting for the other to make a mistake. 

There’s a river nearby, and she decides that is where she will make her stand. The shore is rocky in the waking world, and she hopes it is the same here. Perfect for a careless foot to accidentally betray one’s location. 

Over gnarled roots and fallen branches, Lavellan wades through the Fade, steadily onward until she can see the reflective shine of the river’s curving face through the blackened branches. Vision dazzled, the Elvhen woman tries not to look too closely as she approaches the bank.

Large boulders pepper the shoreline, and there’s a depression in the earth that gives way to the river. Lavellan carefully eases herself over the stones and lowers herself down the bank, sliding to the shore below. Rocks, roots, and soil hang like a rugged ceiling over her head. The shore is only a few feet across here, and with care the woman makes her way along, careful to stay hidden beneath the lip of earth above.

The river itself is frozen over, though the snow looks thinner here, stirred and swept up by the wind into lopsided hills along the bank. Lavellan can see water flowing beneath the ice in places, so close to the surface that perhaps in a few hours time it will have chewed through. 

Once sure she is far enough along, Lavellan finds a small alcove in the earth and tucks herself away. Gingerly stooping down, she plucks a rock and tosses it up stream, back the way she came. It clatters against the ice, skipping and stuttering before finding a hole and plunking into the moving waters. Lavellan hides and waits. 

Minutes go by, and the woman holds her breath. A small breeze sends a curl of snow twisting down the river. Lavellan’s hair drifts around her face, catching on pale lips. 

Then a shadow falls over the riverbed. At first, the Inquisitor hopes it might just be a branch bobbing or the sun shifting, but her gut tells her otherwise. The shadow moves cautiously at first, growing and shrinking in size as if unsure whether or not to press on. The shadow becomes still. Lavellan hears the blood pulsing in her ears. 

_Come on,_ she thinks, her hand gripping the staff at her back.

Whatever her pursuer is, it decides to stalk the riverbed, gliding like a ghost toward her. The shadow stops abruptly, feet from where she crouches.

Back pressed into the jagged soil, Lavellan leans her neck forward an inch, slowly turning her eyes upward. She prays the sound of her heartbeat doesn’t give her away. 

The tips of the beast’s paws are just visible over the edge of the earth, its claws long and sharp. A great and black snout is lifted to the sky, sniffing. It pants slightly, its heavy breath carried into the cold air, drifting across the river as willowy mist. Its shadow is cast along the bank, stretched out against the rocks, and Lavellan discerns ears and a long tail.

A wolf.


	2. Chapter 2

The sound of a bell in the distance summons Lavellan from the Fade.

“Solas,” Lavellan gasps as she wakes, sitting bolt upright. The night is heavy around her, the wards flashing brightly while the camp fills with the sound of clanging bells. 

“What’s-at?” Sera slurs as she sits up in bed, wiping sleep from her eyes. Lavellan doesn’t reply, mind racing. 

_ Does that mean he’s here _ ?

Lavellan kicks at her bedclothes in haste, her legs tangled in a twist of sheets while her arm reaches around wildly for her staff. Wrestling herself free and staggering to a standing position, the Inquisitor clutches her weapon and half sprints to the edge of camp. Kneeling in the dirt, she resets the wards and the clanging fades away, the flashing settling back into a soft haze. The Inquisitor peers into the darkness, but she finds only the gray faces of trees and shrubs staring back at her. Lavellan then darts to another part of camp and does the same, peering into the void and dreading or hoping to see something blinking back.

“Oy!” Sera calls, properly awake now and annoyed. Rainier snorts and starts, rousing from his sleep as well. “What’s this? It’s late.” 

“I-in the Fade,” stammers Lavallen as she drops to all fours, craning her head around a bush. “I saw him.”

“Who’d you see?” Rainier asks, yawning and shaking his head a little.

“S-Solas,” she says, looking up at her companions. “I’m sure it was him. Then the alarms went off and woke me up”

“Balls!” swears Sera, tearing out of her blankets as quickly as she can and grabbing for her bow. “Alright, where is he?” she snaps frantically, drawing an arrow across her chin and spinning around in the dark. “I’ll stick it right between his twangy ears!”

“I-I don’t know!” Lavellan replies, willing her staff to glow as brightly as it can to better illuminate the area around camp. Only the night greets her. “He was by the river, and then I woke up.”

“Hold on,” Rainier sighs, pulling himself into a sitting position. Unlike his companions, he seems much less willing to leave the warmth of his blankets. “How about you tell us everything. Start from the beginning. What did you see?”

Lavellan makes her way back to the fire, looking over her shoulder with wide eyes, her heart hammering. Rainier puts a steadying hand to her back while Sera curses into the night and finishes her own inspection of the perimeter before coming over. They sit close together by the fire, Rainier leaving the comfort of his bed, and Lavellan quickly takes them through her Dream. 

“Shit,” Sera spits while Rainier strokes his beard thoughtfully.

“You think it’s definitely him, then?” the Warden says. Lavellan nods. “The bastard has finally shown his face after all this time. Should have known he couldn’t resist finding you. Can you lay a trap for him? Lure him out? I don’t know how this Fade stuff works, but if you can, you should.”

Sera makes a disgusted and disgruntled noise, folding her arms over her chest. “What? You’re happy about this piss? I hate Fen’Harness, or whatever, and I hate the Fade. It’s a bad idea!”

“It might be a chance for the Inquisition to learn something,” Rainier says, “Better yet, we might be able to capture him. I’m not keen on him any more than you are, Sera, but it’s our job. I’ll stay awake in case he shows up.”

Sera sneers. “Piss. Fine. Whatever.”

Lavellan wets her lips before nodding.

“I think I can trap him,” says Lavellan, swallowing. “We should take the chance.”

Rainier squeezes the Inquisitor’s arm gently.

“You be alright against him on your own?” 

“I’ll be alright,” she replies, though she can’t suppress the note of uncertainty bleeding into her voice. “I should get back to the Fade.”

Sera rolls her eyes and trapses to her bedroll.

“Stupid Fade. Stupid assholes. Shit,” she mutters under her breath. “You come back, alright?”

“I’ll come back,” promises Lavellan. Sera doesn’t say anything else, but angrily tugs her blankets back over her, curling into a small ball. 

Rainier gives Lavellan a slight nod before taking a blanket from his bedroll and draping it around his shoulders. Lavellan notes the hilt of the Warden’s sword poking out from under his pillow. 

It takes much longer for the Inquisitor to fall asleep. The pressure of having to fall asleep causes her anxiety. The pressure of meeting Solas after years apart makes her palms sweat and stomach churn. Her mind races.  _ Could it really be him? _

The Inquisitor decides time is not worth wasting and casts a sleep spell. She’ll wake groggier in the morning, but that hardly seems important. The spell flashes around the campsite, and her last thought is of Sera, hoping her friend didn’t notice. 


	3. Chapter 3

Lavellan stands in the Faded campsite. She wastes no time and crouches low to the ground, casting a second spell. The magic responds quickly, rippling along her skin while glyphs spiral against her body, setting her aglow. It prickles as it spreads, her flesh stretching, itching as fine ivory hair springs from her skin. She grimaces, her head rolling as she eases herself through the transformation. 

Moments later, where a woman had once been now stands a white halla. She flicks an ear, tossing her head from side to side, black eyes scanning the horizon. A smell catches the air, musty like old water but with a sting like iron. Her heart races. Nervously, she stamps a foot against the snowy ground and waits. Nothing. She stamps again, circling around until she catches faint movement in the trees. It’s small, a shift in the shadows that could be anything. Nostrils flaring, she breathes in deeply, and the scent grows stronger. 

It’s him. She knows it. Can feel his eyes on her. Every instinct, every sinew, tells her to bolt. But she holds just a moment longer, to let him know she knows he’s there. Then she flies. 

Through the trees. Over the stones. Wind whipping wildly through her hair. She dives, hooves clattering loudly, but she cares little for the noise they make. Snow erupts like a glittering storm from the ground as she passes over it. The trees seem to bend low. Their branches tug at her flank. She pushes herself onward.

The ground behind shakes. She can feel tremors as the wolf springs loose. He lunges after her, and she imagines his teeth biting at the air. Snatching at her ankles. She can feel his breath, warm. Heart pounding, she wills herself faster than he.

She makes a sharp turn, her hooves slipping on the forest floor in a spray of ice. He skids, too, but she expects the slide and rapidly recovers. This way, she weaves. That way, he flies. The wolf trails behind only but a few paces. 

The river is close. Its smell crisp, cold, and pure compared to the wolf’s musk. Her head bobs up with each leap. Down with each dive. And on each up, she spies the bank. Closer.

Body leaning left, she zags again in a clatter of hooves. He’s ready this time. Muscles flex, fur bristles as he leans his body into her and tears at her ankle. Teeth draw blossoming blood, blooming over the white forest floor. The halla lets out a wail, but on she goes. A little further. Just a little more. A trail of red runs behind her, threads of crimson leading to the wolf’s yawning maw.

Her mark in sight, she lets him gain just a little more. Claws flash. The rumble of a growl makes her shiver. He is nearly upon her when she leaps. Over the edge of the bank, across the shore, she dives to the river below. The wolf follows before realizing his folly. They tumble through the air to the ice below. The thin film shatters as their bodies plunge. Down she goes, caught in the current sweeping her under the ice. The shock of the cold water forces her to transform. She is Elvhen again and feels like all the air in her body has been kicked from her lungs. 

Lavellan turns her head upward, seeing the faint glint of sunlight above and kicks toward it. The river pulls on her, dragging at her cloak and clothes, the cold making her feel stiff. A reaching hand brushes the ice above, and Lavellan calls magic to her. The water bubbles around her fingers, and she presses them upwards into the ice until they sink through and are free. She breaks the surface and frantically feels for the cold face of the river. 

Lungs stinging as though full of fire, she inhales deeply and heaves herself belly first across the ice, praying it doesn’t give out. The woman lies face down and gasping in the snow for a moment before lifting her head. Wary eyes scan the river, up and down stream until she spots what she hoped might see. A dark form lies about fifty feet away. The Inquisitor brushes snow from her face, scrambling to her blistered hands and trembling knees. She eases herself to a standing position. Blood runs down her wounded ankle, warm against her toes. Her leg shakes.

“Solas!” Lavellan snarls hoarsely.

There is no reply. A wind crosses the river. Water drips down her face, from the tip of her red nose to her lips turning a mottled blue. Her fingers shake violently as she pulls together magic, the energy pulsing through her.

“Solas!” she commands. 

A thin laugh peels from the form. It lurches, its back arching unnaturally, and she hesitates, her eyes wide and white. It rises limply from the ground, its body long. Dark shadows gather as it shakes itself a new form.

“Did I put on a good show?” it asks in a silky voice. “Were you convinced?” It hovers above the ground, its body a pinkish-purple hue. Two black horns, twisted like the charred trees, protrude from its head, while violet hair dances upon its head like smokeless flame. A demon of desire.

Lavellan’s heart sinks and the demon smirks. 

“Am I not who you wanted to see?” the demon wheedles. “I’m simply crushed. But if you’ll only have this ‘Solas’, I am all too happy to oblige.” The demon lowers itself to the ground, dark mist gathering again as it assumes a new form.  _ His _ form. The hair fades, the horns receding, as the demon dips into Lavellan’s heart, and molds itself in his likeness. 

“So, it was just you these past nights?” Lavellan demands. The Demon Solas cocks an eyebrow. “Tormenting me?”

“I would not say that, Vhenan,” it replies in Solas’s voice. A sly smile spreads its lips, “Now,” it all but purrs, “Did you call me here, or did he, I wonder? He watches you from afar. You feel his eyes on you.” The demon circles her, and though it looks like Solas, it carries itself with a suanter of the hips and a sway that isn’t his. “Am I yours or his? Or am I a little of both? Either way, simply delicious!”

“Enough!” she barks and the demon cackles.

“Not good enough? Perhaps I will have to try harder. I can be all you wanted and yearned from him and more. A far better lover. I, at least, would lay with you.”

“Oh?” she asks coldly. “And what would it cost me?”

“Me?” it says in mock surprise, touching a hand to its chest. “Why, a body of course. You give me yours, and I tuck you away in a blissful fantasy with your dear Solas. You don’t have to worry about saving the world anymore. No more pining after what you shouldn’t want. Just bliss.” 

Lavellan feels the ache inside her and knows it feeds the demon. But it’s still there.

With a heavy sigh, the Inquisitor shakes her head and stirs the air around her. Lightning crackles at her fingertips, and she breathes her pain into the energy building around her. The demon backs away a little, raising its hands nervously.

“I could also just go!” it says quickly, “No need for a fight!”

Lavellan grimaces, “Tell me, demon,” she asks. “What is a demon of desire before it's perverted by the waking world?” 

The Demon Solas blinks a few times.

“Purpose,” it answers simply. “Usually.”

“And tell me, what purpose is there in pursuing this?” she gestures to the air between herself and the demon. “I love him and I always will, but he has never been my purpose, my reason for doing. You have no power here, Spirit. Leave.”

The demon gathers shadow around it once more, resuming its natural form, but it looks somehow smaller now. It regards the Inquisitor, sliding its hands behind its back.

“But isn’t that why you’re here?” it asks carefully. “You hastened here to see him. Your desire for him outweighed your purpose.”

“No! My purpose was to trap him,” Lavellan shoots back. “To question him!”

The demon clucks its tongue and glides a little closer.

“Tut, tut,” it chastises. “Come now, even you know that’s not entirely true. What were you really here for?  _ Slightly panicked, you realize he’s there. Your stomach is sick with nerves, caught between duty and devotion. He approaches. _ ” The demon growls deeply, its dark eyes boring into Lavellan, making her again feel the part of the halla. 

Lavellan isn’t sure if it’s entirely her fantasy playing out in her mind, or something the demon’s concocted. But to say she hadn’t imagined similar scenarios would be a lie.

_ He approaches from across the snowy bank, Elvhen again. He’s soaked, having pulled himself up through a hole in the ice. Stormy eyes churn and glow, and she bears her staff and barks his name. But Fen’Harel doesn’t seem to care...their bodies bump against the side of the embankment, her free hand pushing up his sodden shirt to feel tender skin beneath. One hand cups her cheek and then tilts her chin toward his face. Breath hot on skin, with his other hand he pushes the small of her back, and her hips slide toward him as his knee rises to rest between her legs. Their lips meet, soft at first, and then hard and desperate. She wraps her arm around his shoulders and pulls him as close as she can. No matter how close she pulls him, it could never be close enough. _

The demon sighs dreamily.

“It always plays out so similarly with you mortals, but it is always nonetheless so passionate. So sensual.” It runs a hand down its side, feeling its own sloping curves and hums with a satisfied little grin.

“Enough!” Lavellan screams, forcing the images from her head, the ache of what she can’t have driven into her heart with each shuddering beat. Magic ripples between her fingers, lightning crackling around them from above as clouds begin to form.

“He dreams of this, too!” it cries with a note of desperation, looking above at the rolling storm. “I’ve seen his heart. I was drawn here by the mutual desire shared between you both. Perhaps there is still hope for you two lovers yet?” Its voice rises at the end, pleading.

Lavellan considers this information. The demon shrinks from her.

“I will make a deal with you, Desire,” she says and a smile flashes across its lips. “If I let you live, you return to torment him. Remind him of his humanity. Do not let him forget what he loses should he destroy the world.”

The storm above intensifies, white bands of light forking and sizzling above, waiting for direction. The Demon is far less than thrilled at this deal, and it flinches as thunder booms from above, shaking snow from the bank. It shivers and nods.

“Very well,” it agrees, swallowing. “I will go and do...my job, I suppose. I shall haunt his dreams, and dance just out of reach. Leave him wondering if it could really be you.” 

“Do that,” she nods. “Do not let him get complacent with his decision to end us all.” 

“You are an oddity,” the demon observes, its head tilted to the side as it watches her curiously. “ _ You have not been what I expected. You have surprised me _ .” Then it bows low and saunters off down the river bed, vanishing some distance away in a tendril of smoke.

The storm dissipates, clouds above moving apart like oil in water.

Lavellan lets out a shuddering breath, her chest trembling as emotion bursts its dam. She sinks to the ice below, allowing grief to wash over her. Tears fall fast, and she holds herself tightly, drawing her knees to her chest. The scene plays over and over in her mind. It had felt so painfully real under the Demon’s magic. She could almost taste him, could feel his heart beating in time with hers. 

She lets herself grieve for a while before wiping her tears away with a thumb and waits. 

Morning eventually comes, and the Inquisitor wakes with a heaviness in her chest. She feels exhausted from the night, and she realizes she’s the last one up. Sitting up groggily, Lavellan wipes her eyes and finds her cheeks are wet. With a sleeve, she surreptitiously brushes the tears away. 

“Did you find him?” Rainier asks, bent over the breakfast fire. The camp smells of bacon and toasting bread. The Inquisitor doesn’t feel much like eating.

“No,” Lavellan pauses. She decides not to tell them about what happened, knowing Sera would greatly disapprove of her speaking and dealing with demons. But more than that, it had been an incredibly private experience, and the Inquisitor finds she doesn’t want to talk much.

“No,” she continues, swallowing hard. “He’s moved on.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It took a great amount of self-control not to title this short, "Ain't No Halla Back Girl", which very much does not fit the tone. Still, I do love me some puns :D


End file.
